The lines continue in the rhyme until its conclusion, reading: “If I catch you tonight / I’ll shoot you on sight / So you’d better take flight / To the Isle of Wight.”

A reply, written by Cecil Day-Lewis and unseen by the public until today, continues in the same theme.

The nine-line-long verse ends: “To ignite / Sticks of dynamite / Is not the chief delight / of Norman Wright / Which is proved by the fact that he is still in sight.”

The poem is clearly signed Cecil Day-Lewis, and was kept by Mr Wright in his Larchfield School autograph book.

It has since passed to the private collection of scholar Roy Davids, and is now being sold at auction by Bonhams, London, on April 10 for an estimate £1,200.

Mr Davids, a renowned collector, said: “To get two such notable poets signing one schoolboy album is remarkable in itself, but this has poems composed especially for the occasion.”

The poems are accompanied by an unflattering short description by Norman Wright, who said Auden was “not a favourite master”, who was “rather uncouth, bit his fingernails to the quick, smoked heavily and spluttered when he spoke”.

“He threw bits of chalk at us when the need arose,” he said. “To a young boy I thought his language was somewhat strong.”